Service 101: A Brief History of Tipping

Though tipping the waiter may feel like something that’s always been part of the dining experience in America, the fact is, the act of tipping is a borrowed custom from Europe.

According to Michael Lynn, a professor at the Cornell University School of Hotel Administration, tipping in the United States began just after the American Civil War in the late 1800’s. Lynn suggests that wealthy Americans traveling abroad to Europe witnessed tipping and brought the aristocratic custom back with them to “show off,” or prove their elevated education and class.

Tipping—which may have originated in the taverns of 17th Century England, where drinkers would slip money to the waiter “to insure promptitude” or T.I.P for short—wasn’t embraced by all Americans when the custom began to make its way into our country’s taverns and dining halls. A movement against tipping began in the late 1890’s as many Americans believed that tipping went against the country’s ideals and allowed a clear servile class that would be financially dependent on a higher class.

A servile attitude for a fee

According to an article that appeared in The New York Times in 1897, there was a movement brewing against tipping in America. The anti-tipping group believed that tipping was the “vilest of imported vices” because it created an aristocratic class in a country that fought hard to eliminate a class-driven society. In 1915 six state legislators from Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, Nebraska, Tennessee and South Carolina attempted and failed to pass an anti-tipping bill that would make leaving gratuities unlawful.

In 1916, William Scott wrote a stinging diatribe against tipping in his book, “The Itching Palm,” in which he stood up against the policy of paying for a service twice (once for the employer and once for the employee). He decried tips to be “democracy’s mortal foe” and creates “a servile attitude for a fee.”

In the American democracy to be servile is incompatible with citizenship. Every tip given in the United States is a blow at our experiment in democracy. The custom announces to the world…that we do not believe practically that “all men are created equal.” Unless a waiter can be a gentleman, democracy is a failure. If any form of service is menial, democracy is a failure. Those Americans who dislike self-respect in servants are undesirable citizens; they belong in an aristocracy.

Scott continues, “If tipping is un-American, some day, some how, it will be uprooted like African slavery”.

While diners and servers alike haven’t stopped grumbling about the tip system, there hasn’t been a serious legislative effort to end the practice since. What do you think?

Reader poll: Can you imagine the restaurant industry adopting a no-tipping policy or has the time for change passed?

41 Comments

Very interesting post. I love that tipping was considered, “The vilest of imported vices.” Too funny. I worked in a restaurant for several years and was never to fond of the tipping system. If it’s done away with, then of course, the hourly wages need to go up. I don’t know many who can survive on $4.50 an hour (that was the hourly wage I made before tips). I wouldn’t mind, as a customer, paying a bit more for each order so that I didn’t need to tip at the end.

I’ve been following your tipping series with interest, and it’s made me think about whether the restaurant experience might not be improved if there were no such thing as tipping.

I’m gonna say it would be. I’m not sure it would change the experience for most diners — unless service is really crappy or truly outstanding, I automatically tip 20%, so all it would do for me is spare me the calculation. But reading these pieces made me think about it more from the server’s point of view. I suspect that knowing you’re going to make a living wage, and not be subject to the whims of jerks or cheapskates, would make service seem like a more dignified job.

It would take a while for American diners to get accustomed to higher menu prices and no tips, but I think they’d adjust. Let’s do it. Service shouldn’t be servile.

This is interesting! Just like anything else it can go both ways, it would be nice for servers to know how much they are getting for their work, but at the same time it is nice for the customer to decide what the service was worth. I’ve been taken care off by great servers and not so helpful ones. I am sure waiters feel the same way about customers, there’s nice generous diners and impossible to please, cheap ones.

[…] Tipping, originally a European concept, was a social custom brought back to the U.S. in the late 1800′s after many wealthy Americans had taken trips to Europe and experienced the practice first hand, according to Lynn. […]

Reader’s Digest posted a slanted article on ‘tipping’ in America on Jan 7, 2012 and was picked-up on Yahoo Shine – 6 days later there are over 10,900 comments! Clearly this is a subject which is totally misunderstood by both customers and servers. Americans should stop complaining about the low wages in the developing countries competing for their US jobs – it is happening in their own country in the restaurant-business. This is not a job – this is slavery and it needs to be viewed this way. Salaries for the restaurant business are regulated and in many states it is common to pay $ 2.13 /hour + tips. From the comments, this barely pays the babysitter for many waitresses.
View the article and comments at linkhttp://shine.yahoo.com/financially-fit/tipping-correctly-161000019.html#more-id

[…] mother struggling with the stroller, I focus on how I hesitated too long before I put money in the barista’s tip jar. I can avoid a nice swim in the happiness of my work, to wallow in the problems. I’ll scrutinize […]

[…] worldwide custom. I do not neccessarily think obligatory tipping is a custom we should preserve. http://www.foodwoolf.com/2010/08/his…f-tipping.html Last edited by Greenridgeman; Today at 07:47 AM. Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for […]

As Rudy Vallee said in a movie many, many years ago – “Tipping is un-American!” – a belief to which I subscribe. It seems to me that tipping has created a beggar-class of citizen. Servers are put in the position of playing up to customers, hoping to increase the tip one might receive. It also seems to me that every person who works is entitled to a wage commensurate with the service performed. If servers in restaurants are paid according to their performance, a good wage would ensue for those who give good service, and those who do not would find themselves looking for another job.

I’ve often wondered why the garage owner in the Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart movie “The Petrified Forest” makes the point that tipping is “un-American”. So the attitude endured until at least 1936. I never understood what he meant until now.

As a Brit, tipping is something I associate a lot more with the US than Europe; it’s more unusual to have to rely on tips just to get by here.

I’m starting to realize the importance of tips when it comes to hospitality and commissions to sales, they are those extra pay for people who perform great service like cracking you a joke, or taking the time to listen to you, which is in some cases as needed as the food they served. Tipping shows your appreciation for the extra hard work that waiters, sales people, and other service people do for you. I follow the axiom that money speaks louder than words.

Once in a restaurant down south, two business men decided to see if generous tips got them better service. After establishing themselves as regulars at a particular Australian-themed steak house, they began leaving outrageously large tips (well over the cost of their meals). After a couple months of this, they conceded that service did not improve – they still had the regular range of less than average to slightly better than average that was the norm before the generous tipping began.

I absolutely agree that tipping is a vile practice that creates a classist division between the tipper and the tipped. This practice encourages people who receive tips to see what should be genuine helping and giving, real, friendly and heart felt assistance to others, as a means of making income. It is likely that we all know that we can buy a waiters, drivers or other’s greater help and assistance by tipping. The other side of this equasion is often that if we do not tip we will be ignored or get lesser service. Tipping is a Pavlovian dog experience that encourages people to only give help if they are tipped, and to not to give help if they are not tipped. Employees should be paid a wage commensurate with their abilities and people who agree to pay a price for a meal or a hotel stay, or whatever service, should only be required to pay that amount, and no more. Tipping is not an ethical business practice as it requires that a person pay more for the service or goods that contracted for.

Wait staff receives abysmally low wages & have the mistaken attitude that they are “entitled” to tips as part of their salary, missing entirely that it is called “gratuity” for a reason. I would like to see the minimum wage policy applied to the restaurant industry and send the practice of tipping the way of the dinosaur.

I think it is easy to see that there is a social divide between the server and the patron that tipping creates. This is especially easy to see if you are close friends with someone and they serve you, you are obviously going to tip well, because they are your friend, but if you tip TOO well then it feels like you are giving them charity because they are somehow in a “lower” job than you (even if they actually make more money than you do).

I generally tend to over tip. Going with 20%+ depending on the service. And will also generally tip more if I’m ordering a lot of drinks as I know the bartender and wait staff generally have to share tips. I would definitely prefer if tip was included in the price of the food. I think patrons would adjust easily, especially in America. We are already willing to pay $10 for a Coke and some popcorn at the movies, with the understand that the reason is that we are actually paying that money to support the staff of the movie theater.

Perhaps all it takes is for a restaurant to start this change on it’s own. Charge more but state that tipping isn’t allowed or not required. Then pay their employees a proper wage. As an american in the UK, it has taken me time to adjust to not tipping like I did back home. In pubs you do not tip the bartender. If you order a meal, usually it has been included in the bill. Tipping isn’t expected as much here – cab rides or delivery service and such it isn’t expected. One thing though is it’s nice when you give a tip and it is genuinely appreciated rather than expected.

[…] tipping a server was a way of differentiating between them and the patron in a way that was far too reminiscent of the British aristocracy for their tastes. America was supposed to be a country which didn’t create upper and lower […]

I`ve never been a waitress, but I’ve been a customer many a time. Personally, I think tipping is fine. Many people think not, but being paid minimum wage is just that – the bare minimum. Tips are 1.) a good way for a waiter/waitress to see how well their service is, and to reflect and improve upon it, #2.) an easy and helpful way to earn that extra money for you only, #3.) a sign of saying “thank you.”, from a customer, thus making the customer feel good, not because he’s “giving to charity” and “ruining the country’s ideals” (come on, the country has worse problems!) but because they’re expressing gratitude (remember this saying: “actions speak louder than words”?) in a way that seems traditional, and sensible. Giving a gift to a co-worker whether a Cheryl’s cookie, or a $50 gift card, isn’t considered “ruining the country’s ideals”… so why is this? Yes, I know “you know your co-worker more than a random waitress” is your response but then why do we support beggars? A 9-year old girl wasn’t allowed to sell mistletoe at a market, to raise money for braces, becuase she didn’t have a vendor’s license, but the guard said she could BEG for it. I think the attempts to strive against tippinng are more rude and complainitive to the customer more than to a waiter/waitress. Don’t want the money? Then “donate it to charity.” We’re just trying to say thank you… is that not allowed?

[…] 1915 that would have finished tipping illegal. In William Scott’s 1916 book The Itching Palm, he goes as distant as to claim “Every tip given in a United States is a blow during a examination in democracy. The tradition […]

[…] I was able to find out that the word tip is actually an acronym. That acronym stands for “To Insure Promptitude” and the original origin of the tip can be traced back to taverns in England during the 17th […]

I wouldn’t mind giving up the tipping system for a higher wage at where I work some days. But that’s because the area I work in, is lower class. I’m sure other areas and other restaurants have employees who would prefer tips because they probably are able to make much more than an hourly wage would allow and they would have to work more hours to make the same amount which is hard to do physically consistently for a long period of time, being on your feet and carrying heavy trays back and forth. I cannot go any longer than 6 hours without it affecting my lower back so bad that I can barely walk after I sit down. And I’m not heavy.